Quality Assurance Lead

Holistic Partners, Inc; Dallas (TX); On-site; USD 100,000 - 160,000; Full time

Job summary

Holistic Partners, Inc. is seeking a QA Lead to own test planning, execution, and release readiness for multiple applications. You will mentor analysts, coordinate across onshore and offshore teams, and ensure end-to-end quality and risk-aware delivery.

The role requires hands-on testing, strong collaboration with analysts, developers, and stakeholders, and proactive QA governance across Agile/Waterfall projects. On-site in Dallas preferred.

Qualifications

• Minimum 5+ years in software QA with testing leadership.
• Experience coordinating offshore QA teams across time zones.
• Ability to translate requirements into test plans and coverage.
• Strong analytical and risk assessment skills.
• Experience with end-to-end and integration testing.

Responsibilities

• Lead test planning, coordination, and execution for assigned projects.
• Mentor QA analysts and manage day-to-day testing activities.
• Coordinate testing across onshore/offshore teams and vendors.
• Perform hands-on testing and review test evidence and results.
• Maintain traceability from requirements to tests and defects.
• Prepare test completion summaries and release readiness input.
• Participate in Scrum ceremonies to align QA with development.”],
• CoT_job_summary_short
• COMPANY NAME: Holistic Partners, IncKEY POINTS: QA leadership, test planning, offshore coordination

Skills

Test planning

Hands-on testing

QA leadership

SQL

API testing

Azure DevOps

Jira

Stakeholder communication

Mentorship

Defect management

Education

Bachelor's degree or equivalent

Tools

Azure DevOps

Jira

Job description

• The Quality Assurance (QA) Lead is responsible for leading test planning, coordination, and execution for assigned projects and business applications at Do it Best. This role owns the quality and completeness of QA deliverables and ensures testing validates business requirements, system integrations, and operational workflows.
• The QA Lead independently manages assigned work, provides day-to-day direction to QA analysts, and performs hands-on testing. The role works closely with Business Analysts, project managers, developers, architects, and business stakeholders to resolve gaps, coordinate testing dependencies, and provide clear recommendations on release readiness.
• The role requires experience managing offshore testing teams, including coordinating work across time zones, setting clear delivery expectations, creating and managing KPI and testing metrics, and understanding vendor contracts, scope, and responsibilities.
• In addition to delivering testing, the QA Lead mentors team members, reviews test plans and scripts, and helps establish consistent QA practices. The role identifies risks early, maintains accurate progress reporting, and focuses testing on areas with the greatest business impact.
• The QA Lead actively participates in Scrum ceremonies to understand requirements and proposed solutions, identify testing needs and prerequisites, and ensure QA considerations are addressed throughout development.

Responsibilities Include

1. QA Delivery Ownership

• Own QA activities for assigned projects from initial planning through test completion and release support.
• Define testing scope, estimates, resource needs, milestones, and entry and exit criteria based on business risk.
• Assign testing work, balance workloads, and make ownership and expected completion dates clear.
• Track test preparation and execution progress, identify schedule risks, and escalate capacity constraints or priority conflicts.
• Confirm testing prerequisites, including environments, access, test data, and dependencies, with the responsible teams.

2. Test Planning and Execution

• Review requirements and acceptance criteria with Business Analysts to identify gaps and ensure requirements are testable.
• Develop and peer-review test plans, scenarios, scripts, and data for functional, integration, regression, and end-to-end testing.
• Maintain traceability between requirements, test coverage, execution results, and defects.
• Perform hands-on testing, review evidence, and ensure critical workflows, exception paths, and downstream impacts receive appropriate coverage.
• Retest fixes, assess regression needs, and document incomplete testing and remaining risks before recommending QA completion.

3. Cross-Functional Leadership

• Coordinate testing across business and technology teams, external partners, and onshore and offshore QA resources.
• Facilitate QA working sessions focused on progress, blockers, decisions, and agreed next steps.
• Resolve unclear requirements, dependencies, and ownership with the appropriate Business Analysts, developers, and project managers.
• Communicate testing status and business impacts clearly, including preparation progress, execution results, blockers, and open defects.

4. Independence and Judgment

• Determine the appropriate testing approach and level of coverage based on complexity, change impact, and business risk.
• Challenge incomplete requirements, unrealistic testing timelines, and unsupported assumptions with clear evidence and practical options.
• Escalate risks and decisions with context, business impact, and a recommended path forward.
• Maintain testing discipline under pressure, making coverage tradeoffs and residual risks visible to decision-makers.

5. Mentorship and QA Practice Development

• Coach QA analysts on test design, data validation, defect documentation, business processes, and delivery ownership.
• Review QA deliverables and provide practical feedback that improves accuracy, completeness, and consistency.
• Support onboarding, knowledge sharing, and consistent use of QA standards, templates, and tools.
• Identify repeatable tests for automation and partner with automation and performance specialists on coverage and priorities.
• Use defect patterns, production issues, and lessons learned to improve testing practices and reduce avoidable rework.

6. Defect Management and Release Support

• Ensure defects include reproducible steps, expected and actual results, supporting evidence, and business impact.
• Facilitate defect triage, coordinate severity and priority decisions, and track resolution, retesting, and closure.
• Support Business Analyst-led UAT by coordinating environments, test data, defect tracking, and retesting with business participants.
• Prepare test completion summaries covering results, unresolved defects, remaining risks, and recommended release conditions.
• Provide QA input to release decisions and support post-release validation and issue investigation as needed.

Expected Capabilities

The QA Lead is expected to bring five or more years of software QA experience, including at least two years leading testing activities or coordinating QA teams, and demonstrate:

• Strong ownership of test planning, execution, defect resolution tracking, and QA deliverable quality.
• Experience testing multiple applications and integrations while managing concurrent priorities.
• Understanding of the software development lifecycle, testing methods, and Agile and traditional delivery approaches.
• Working knowledge of SQL, API testing, and data validation.
• Experience with Azure DevOps, Jira, or comparable test and defect management tools.
• Ability to translate business requirements and acceptance criteria into practical test coverage.
• Clear written and verbal communication, effective facilitation, and sound judgment when escalating risks.
• Ability to coach analysts, coordinate distributed teams, and maintain quality under tight timelines.

Preferred Background:

• Retail, distribution, logistics, merchandising, or finance applications.
• ERP and legacy systems.
• Data conversions.
• Test automation, performance testing, and CI/CD pipelines.
• A related bachelor's degree or equivalent practical experience is preferred.

Success Measures

Success in this role is measured by the QA Lead's ability to:

• Deliver agreed testing milestones with clear ownership, realistic plans, and timely escalation of risks.
• Provide traceable coverage of requirements, critical workflows, integrations, and identified business risks.
• Maintain accurate reporting that distinguishes planned, executed, passed, failed, and blocked tests.
• Reduce avoidable rework by identifying requirement gaps, data issues, and environment constraints early.
• Drive timely defect resolution and retesting while keeping significant open defects and their impacts visible.
• Provide release recommendations supported by test evidence, exit criteria, and documented residual risks.
• Improve QA deliverable consistency, team capability, and coverage based on lessons from escaped defects.

Role Differentiation

A QA Analyst owns assigned test preparation and execution.

• The QA Lead owns test planning, team coordination, and QA delivery for assigned projects or applications, while continuing hands‑on testing if needed.
• QA management owns formal people management, staffing, budgets, and the QA function roadmap.
• Business Analysts coordinate UAT, business owners approve acceptance, and the designated release authority makes the final release decision with QA input.